Phew! What a month it has been. As can happen, the best laid
plans come to zero. Our lives were turned around on Sunday 4 August when the
Police phoned and told Marie her father had been involved in a motor vehicle accident.
They said he was in hospital and that he was okay. We immediately stopped what
we were doing at the time and went straight to the hospital.

As the evening unfolded and we spoke to the medical staff in
the emergency department, we were not certain how the future would unfold.
Would he pass away, or would he make a full recovery, or would it be somewhere in
between? Being 92 years of age, his chances were not rated highly. The Neuro
Surgeon told us he had a bleed on the brain and some fractured vertebrae in his
spine.

Given these circumstances, we cancelled our planned 5-week
overseas holiday so we could be here to assist in his recovery and adaption to
life without a motor vehicle. Now, he is in rehabilitation and progressing
well. Accordingly, photography has been less prominent in our lives as we have
spent a lot of time visiting him and attending to some of his affairs.

I am pleased I had devoted some time to choosing images for
the monthly competitions so I could submit entries for while we were away. This
meant I just had to send the images to the printer for them to be ready. For
the August competition I submitted my entries into the Open section. The
results I obtained were very pleasing. Here are my entries and the results:

Cloud over Marseille – (Merit)

Three Doors – (Merit)

Burlesque Babe – (Honour)

As I mentioned last post, the opportunity to learn about
Photoshop from Andy Cross through Maud
Street Photo Gallery over six Sundays was too good to pass up. I completed
the last three modules since last post and now need to get my notes up to date
and indexed so I can find the techniques I need during my workflow. As with
most things, if I don’t use what I have learned, it will be forgotten and
attending the course will have been a waste.

The September competition topic is “Framed”. The definition
we have been provided with is:

Framed refers to using elements of a scene to create a frame within
your frame. For example, you might shoot through a doorway, pulled back
curtains, branches, fences, tunnels, or arches to highlight your subject.

I have worked on some images that fit this definition. They
will likely be the ones I submit to the set subject category rather than the open
category in September.

Where did the time go? Seems like the last few weeks are one
big blur! There haven’t been many opportunities to get the camera out and make
some images. From having a week and a half off work due to the flu and spending
the last three Sundays attending Photoshop lessons, very little time has been
left over.

The deadline for submitting images for the monthly
competition seemed to approach without warning and caught me unprepared.
Therefore, I quickly scrambled three images I entered in the annual competition
last year and submitted them in the monthly open section. I was disappointed
all three images were only awarded acceptances.

I think this is a valuable lesson though. Just because an image performed well in the annual competition, there is no guarantee it will perform well in the open section of the monthly competitions.

Leanne in the Ring – this image placed second in the People section of the annual competition last year. The judge indicated there were some lighting issues with the image especially around the hand gesture. This area is a key focus point of the image that we want the viewer to look at and the hand is not lit well enough to draw the eye.

Preparing for Winter – this image placed first in the Social Documentary/Photo Journalism section of the annual competition. As an image in the Open section, it didn’t hit the mark well enough. The guy throwing the piece of wood is too dark and needs to be lightened so he is more a point of focus in the image. Some of the lighter areas could be darkened to draw the eye through the image.

Weaver at Work – this image placed third in the Social
Documentary/Photo Journalism section of the annual competition. The judge
indicated this may have worked better as a black and white image due to the
varying strong colours in the background which distract the viewer.

Photoshop is a tool I have used but struggled with in the
past. My prior education has been via Google searches to find out how to do
what I wanted to achieve. The opportunity to learn from Andy Cross through Maud Street Photo Gallery over six
Sundays was too good to pass up. To date, I have completed three modules with
three modules to go.

Marie and I are going on a long-awaited break soon so I am
working hard to prepare my competition images for while we are away. Also, I am
aiming to prepare images for just after we get back. This will reduce the
pressure and make it easier to start reviewing the images we have returned
with.

This month has been a mixed bag with Marie having her
cataracts removed and a little down time as a result. I have also spent some
time thinking of some techniques I need to work on. A couple of weekends ago, I
wanted to test a Photoshop technique where you can photograph a scene and have
the people removed. To achieve this, I took my tripod out and captured images
for approximately eight minutes of various buildings around Brisbane. Taking an
image every 45 seconds resulted in around 10 images per location.

The ten images for a location are then loaded into one file
in Photoshop and a script is run which creates an image of the unchanged parts
of the images taken. Most had some artefacts still, but I had one image where
it required virtually no extra work to get the result I wanted. This image was
of the Brisbane GPO and it appears below:

Marie and I are focusing on improving our fitness and on
most Saturdays walked to build stamina and along the way capture some images.
Here is a small selection of images I captured on these walks:

I submitted some images for the Presenters Night at BCG this
month. A short showing of members current work is made so we can see how our
images look on the large screen. Here are the ones I submitted:

BCG came second in the River City Print Competition which
was a very pleasing outcome for the club. This competition is “impact judged”
and my prints performed around the middle of the pack. Looking at the scores
reinforces to me how subjective judging can be. I had one print in the Non-A
Grade Colour section and it scored 21 out of a possible 30 points. The three
judges scored it as 8, 5, & 8. The highest scoring print in the section
scored 26 out of 30 points.

The most surprising result for me was my print “Walking Down
the Alleyway” which was in the Non-A Grade Monochrome section. In the BCG
annual competition late last year, this image was judged the best overall
monochrome print for the club. The judges in the River City Print Competition
judged it as 3, 5, & 8 totalling 16 out of a possible 30 points. The
diversity in scores from the judges for this print shows just how much
subjectivity there is in judging.

I entered two images in the set subject for the BCG monthly
competition. The set subject topic was “Negative Space”. I received one
acceptance and one honour. Also, I entered one image in Open and it received an
acceptance. The highlight for me was winning the best image overall in my grade
for the month for which I received a Sponsors Award from Brisbane Camera Hire
to the value of $30.

July’s Competition topic is “Photo Replication”. The
definition is: “Photo Replication is the
copy or reproduction of a famous photograph, painting, sculpture or piece of
art. It can be replicated, reproduced or copied in any way as interpreted by
the photographer, however the photo must clearly remind the viewer of the
artist’s/photographer’s style. Photo
Replication is not considered plagiarism as this is the intention of
this concept to flatter the artist’s/photographer’s work by copying or
reproducing his/her’s work. The image can be in mono or colour.”

Marie and I attended the Photographic Society of Queensland
(PSQ) Convention which was held over the long weekend in May. It was a great
opportunity to catch up with some old faces and to meet some new ones too. The
program was varied, and I gained some insights that I am sure will help my
photography over time.

The keynote speaker was Professor Des Crawley who spoke on “Visual
Cultures and the Imagined Vision”. There was so much in this presentation and I
am very grateful he made the slides and supporting material available to
attendees. I am planning to refresh my memory by working through his papers.

He also closed the Convention by speaking on “Developing
Creativity at Club Level – The Portfolio Process”. This talk also provided many
insights and I think will assist me with my next print project with Brisbane
Camera Group (BCG). Many of the principles can also be applied to photobooks
too.

Another speaker I found particularly interesting was Adam
Williams. He spoke on “The Search for Meaningful Photography” and lead a
workshop on “Creative Photoshop Wizardry”. Russell Brown spoke on “Change the
Channel – Utilising the power of colour spaces in Photoshop” and afterwards I
purchased his book, so I could follow some of his techniques to improve my
images.

My first photobook arrived in the post during the month. It was done using chatbooks and I am happy with the results. Like any other first, it is a learning process. I need to pay more attention to the settings when I am ordering as the size was not what I expected. Also, I thought I selected that the title be on the spine but that didn’t happen. From a image selection perspective, I need to be careful not to have key elements too close to where the book is bound.

Recently I attended a photo walk conducted by Bruno
Domingues Photography which focused on natural light portraiture in various
Brisbane CBD locations. There were approximately 30 attendees and 6 models.
This was very much an opportunity to create images of the models rather than
being a workshop. Here is a selection of some of my images:

Each Presenters Night at BCG has a short showing of members’
work. I don’t submit every month as I often forget or am more focused on
getting my competition images ready. This month I did submit some images and
here they are:

Each year the club enters the River City Print Competition
which is for clubs located in South East Queensland. I have been fortunate
enough to have some of my images selected to form part of the club entry. They
are below:

I entered three images in the set subject for the BCG monthly competition. The set subject topic was “Impressionist”. I received 2 Merits and 1 Honour.

June’s Competition topic is “Negative Space”. The definition
is “Negative space, is the space around
and between the subject(s) of an image. Negative space may be most evident when
the space around a subject, not the subject itself, forms an interesting or
artistically relevant shape, and such space occasionally is used to artistic
effect as the “real” subject of an image.”

I haven’t given this topic any thought yet, so I had better
get moving and seeing what I can produce. It is always good to have a challenge
that I can learn and improve from.

This month just seems to have been busy! I ran out of time
to prepare images that met the Brisbane Camera Group monthly competition topic
of “Transportation”. As I could use images from the annual competitions that
hadn’t previously been used in monthly competitions, I decided to enter three
in the Open section.

Two of my entries received acceptances and one received a merit. I was hopeful of a better result but I think effort to make new work in the set subject rather than pulling out old images for the open section will push me harder and build my skills better. The images I entered are below.

Romenade du Paillon (Acceptance)

Scanno Exit Reflections (Acceptance)

The Strongest Man (Merit)

At the Brisbane Camera Group Presenters Night, we were given
a taste of photo books in all their shapes and sizes. My eyes were opened to
the creative efforts some people make with there books. The following week we
had a “workshop” session and I discovered websites and software available to
create photo books and the various services that will print them.

While I had no plans to get involved in photo books when I attended these sessions, I came away motivated to give it a try. One of the options I was impressed with was the books available through chatbooks.com. This seemed like a great way to dip my toe into the water for very little cost. So, I picked 30 images from the week Marie and I spent in Caloundra in February to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary. I have titled the book “30 Years – February 2019”. I am now eagerly waiting for it to be printed and delivered.

Marie has been working on her skills in taking in camera multiple exposure images. On our last photo walk, I have also been giving this form of photography a go to see what I can do with it. Doing it on a photo walk means one’s creativity is stretched to the max as you have to make the best of what is presented to you. This makes it challenging and difficult to get to come away with many “winners”. We also did a photo walk through the valley on a Saturday night which was an interesting experience.

Here are some of my recent images:

Looking to next month’s competition, the topic is “Impressionist”.
The definition is “A style when the
photographer tries to convey the feeling of a scene, a general impression, or
suggestion of a scene. Lacking in detail these impressionist images emphasize
colour over line and are often soft, dreamy, and have a painterly feel.” I
am working on some images and plan to have three prints to submit for this
topic. I am confident I won’t need to resort to finding images for the open
section to compete in May.

Wow! Is it really two months since I posted my last update?
Where has the time disappeared to? All I can say is I have been busy, and I
know that is no excuse.

The Brisbane Camera Group February competition has been and
gone and my result was an acceptance for each image submitted. This was not the
start of the year I was looking for as I was hoping for one or two merits at
least. While I understand the judge’s reasons for the acceptances, I also know
they are opinions I can choose to take on board or not. Here are the images:

Church of Saint Ferreol-Augustinians Marseille – The judge suggested the image could be improved by cloning out the church behind.

Inside Galleria Umberto I – Naples. Improvements suggested included showing less of the ceiling and having a panorama style print showing the art work with less distractions.

La Pergola Nice France – He suggested less sky and a person
on one of the balconies would make a difference.

In February, Marie and I spent a week in Caloundra celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary. We both took many images especially of the beach. Marie has been playing around with in camera multiple images and encouraged me to give it a try. Here are a couple of my images that worked out okay.

Ice Cream Time at NoosaKeeping a WatchLearning to be Surf Life Savers

The March competition topic was “Movement” – “a finished image that depicts motion blur resulting from long exposure or panning or in camera movement. The image cannot be a freeze frame photo, it must show some blur in some part of the image.” I submitted two prints into the competition set subject and one print into the open section.

This was a far better month! I received one merit and two
honours, so I am really pleased with these results. My “Movement” prints scored
a merit and honour while my open entry was an honour. Here are the images:

Slow Dancer (awarded an honour)Getting Ready to go back for More (awarded a merit)Bicycle Built for Two (awarded an honour)

Looking to next month’s competition, the topic is “Transportation”. The definition is “The image must show the action of transporting someone or something or the process of being transported.” I haven’t begun to think about this topic yet. Time is running out, so I need to start sooner rather than later.

It is hard to believe that January is almost behind me. Where
has the first month of the year gone? Usually, January is a great time to put
plans into place to achieve my goals. This year seems to be very fuzzy just
now.

I have been saying my key photography goal this year is to
do what’s required to move from AB Grade to A Grade at Brisbane Camera Group.
What this means is I need to submit a minimum of 15 images in the monthly
competitions and achieve a grade point average of at least 10. I have been
asked what genre I am going to focus on. This is a tough question that I don’t
have an answer for. My thought is to focus on the set subjects each month
wherever possible and to do prints rather than DPIs.

The first monthly competition is in February and the set
subject is architecture. The definition is “..The picture must be of a building intended for human occupation or use.
It may be a picture of the exterior or interior and may be a detail of a
limited part of a building or buildings that displays architectural angles and
lines in a dynamic or colourful way (Monochrome allowed)…”

While I have thought of going out and taking images around
Brisbane in readiness for the competition, I find now that time is running out.
Instead, I have reviewed my images from the last couple of years and have
decided to submit three images from our trip to Italy/France in
September/October 2017.

Last weekend Marie and I attended a workshop run by Digital
Camera Warehouse. The topic was blur and sharpness in the same image. They had
two dancers for us to photograph in a studio setting. While the dancers were
great, the backgrounds were not great, and I was left with a feeling I would
not get anything out of the images.

The March Monthly Competition set subject is “movement”. Hopefully I can rescue a couple of images from the workshop to enable me to submit them. This could be a further opportunity to improve my Photoshop skills. Here are a couple of images from the workshop:

So what else have I been doing since my last post? I pondered the question: what do you do will all the images that just missed the cut for my Print Project submission last year? I decided to use a number of these images around a theme or series and apply some textures and effects to re-purpose them. Here are the series I created:

Sorry for the delay in putting up this post. I decided to change web hosts and plans to save some money as this is a hobby site. This wasn’t the best idea and I have been sorting out performance issues since and have needed to upgrade my hosting plan to be able to do what I need to do. As a result very little financial saving has been achieved, just plenty of lost time.

Brisbane Camera Group held its Annual Dinner and Awards Night on 3 December. My prints did well (view them here) and I was happy with the outcome. Here is a list of my results:

Being at the judging gave me an insight into how to improve some of my images. In Pictorial Colour Prints, my image was a tie for first place. The judges were required to judge these two images again for first and second placing. A key reason my image came second was the central part of the ceiling was off centre. In People Prints, my image was also a tie for first place. The other image was very different to my image. However, a key factor was not all of the shadow was in my image. If it had have been then I may have placed first.

These are tips for me to remember when preparing my images for future competitions. That said, I was pleased with my haul of ten awards in my grade for the print categories. There were two more moments in the evening that I am proud of. The Club Champion Monochrome Print is selected from all the monochrome prints that placed irrespective of grade. My print “Walking Down The Alleyway” was chosen as the recipient of this award. It was a very proud moment to have won the Champion Monochrome Print. Here is an image of me receiving my award:

After the judging, a couple of the judges suggested my image would have improved by reducing the impact of the sky. It could be either darkened or cropped as the key focus is the two people walking down the alleyway. Here is a copy of the image after implementing the judges’ suggestions.

At the end of the night I was awarded the President’s Award for my service to the Club over the year. This is a book prize and is tremendous recognition for my contribution to the Club. Here is an image of me receiving my award:

After completing my Print Project which was exhibited last month with other members of Brisbane Camera Group, I was wondering what to do with the many images that didn’t quite make the final six images. I decided to start a series based on “…everyone wants to be a clown…” and call it “Clownsville”. This series has been appearing on my Instagram account. Here is a selection of the images:

Now that the year is drawing to a close, I will have some time to think about what I want to achieve in photography in 2019. Club activities recommence in February but the first monthly competition needs to be planned for and images created by late January. The first topic is “Architecture” and it is defined as “The picture must be of a building intended for human occupation or use. It may be a picture of the exterior or interior and may be a detail of a limited part of a building or buildings that displays architectural angles and lines in a dynamic or colourful way (Monochrome allowed).” That will be my first challenge.

Wishing you all the very best of the festive season. May 2019 bring you closer to what you desire in photography and life. Thanks for reading my posts and following my progress.

This month my focus has been on the Print Project Challenge. The submission date was 5 November and I just achieved this. I sent my images to Streets Imaging on Wednesday 31 October and collected them on Thursday 1 November after work. The paper stock was beautiful but the actual images were over sharpened and could not be used. I knew what I had done wrong and was able to go back to the previous version of the images and send them off for reprint. Fortunately they were ready on Friday 2 November for collection after work. I was then able to mat them over the weekend.

Opening night for the exhibition was on 16 November at The Maud Street Photo Gallery. Marie also had images in the exhibition along with 17 other members of Brisbane Camera Group. Marie’s images were stunning and she has taken a giant leap forward in her photographic development. My Photoshop skills continue to develop and I think my images are an improvement on what I presented last year.

Image courtesy of Marie Sinclair

My project is titled “It’s the Time” and is based on a poem I wrote 20 years ago. This project aimed to reinterpret the poem as a series of photographic images. Click here to read my artist statement and poem. Here are the images I exhibited:

There was no monthly competition in November. Marie and I assisted other club members on 4 November for the annual competition print judging. This is a hectic day and everyone was tired when it finished. I submitted 23 prints over 6 categories. One print was disqualified as I made a mistake in the entry process. I had 3 images in Nature but after the disqualification I ended with only 2 images in the category.

Marie and I are both AB grade members. It was disappointing that only 4 AB grade members (including Marie and I) entered prints in the annual competition. The results of the judging will be announced at the Club’s Annual Dinner on 3 December. The images I submitted this year can be viewed by clicking here.

Since last post I have submitted a number of images to my Instagram account. Here is a sampling of some of them:

My next post will be after the Brisbane Camera Group Annual Dinner on 3 December. I will then know how my prints performed and will be able to share that news.

During the month Marie and I attended a natural light portrait photography workshop run by Ash Kashyap and the model was Helena Schutt. Portraits in natural light can be quite tricky and it is important not to have the model in direct sunlight otherwise there will be skin blow outs. Also, having the model too far into shadow can lead to flat images. Both Marie and I really enjoyed photographing Helena and we came away with some images we were very happy with. Here is a small selection of images I created at the workshop:

Each month at the Brisbane Camera Group Speakers Night, there is a digital show of images submitted by members. This show enables members to submit images they have been working on and share them with their fellow members without being critiqued or judged. For the show on 8 October, I submitted the following images:

The monthly competition topic was “Old Things” – images where the central feature is an object or objects that is old. It is not necessary to be antique. I entered one image in the Digital Projected Image section. The judging was conducted last Monday night and my image was an acceptance only. The judge said the background distracted from the subject. On reflection, I can appreciate what he said and it reminds me I need to pay more attention to all the detail in my images. Here is the image I submitted:

The rest of the month was spent on preparing and printing images for my entry into the Club’s annual competition. A maximum of 24 images can be submitted over 6 categories. My entry is 23 images. The categories are Pictorial Colour, Pictorial Monochrome, People, Creative/Experimental, Social Documentary/Photo Journalism and Nature. Nature was my weakest area and I only submitted 3 of a possible 4 images. Judging of the print entries will be conducted on Sunday 4 November 2018 so I should have an idea of how my images performed after that.

Our Print Project Challenge is also due for submission by 4 November 2018. I have my 6 images almost ready but need to do further work to fix a few issues before they go to print. All Brisbane Camera Group members participating in this activity will have their images exhibited in The Maud Street Photo Gallery. Opening night will be 16 November and the exhibition will finish on Sunday evening 18 November. It is always a proud moment to have your images on the wall of a gallery – especially Brisbane’s number 1 photography gallery.